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| Chapter IX.
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Chapter IX.
In short, what patriarch, what prophet, what
Levite, or priest, or ruler, or at a later period what apostle, or
preacher of the gospel, or bishop, do you ever find the wearer of a
crown?407
| 407 [But see Eusebius,
Hist. B. v., cap. 24, whose story is examined by Lardner,
Cred., vol. iv., p. 448.] | I think not even the temple of God itself was
crowned; as neither was the ark of the testament, nor the tabernacle of
witness, nor the altar, nor the candlestick crowned though certainly,
both on that first solemnity of the dedication, and in that second
rejoicing for the restoration, crowning would have been most suitable
if it were worthy of God. But if these things were figures of us (for
we are temples of God, and altars, and lights, and sacred vessels),
this too they in figure set forth, that the people of God ought not to
be crowned. The reality must always correspond with the image. If,
perhaps, you object that Christ Himself was crowned, to that you will
get the brief reply: Be you too crowned, as He was; you have full
permission. Yet even that crown of insolent ungodliness was not of any
decree of the Jewish people. It was a device of the Roman soldiers,
taken from the practice of the world,—a practice which the people
of God never allowed either on the occasion of public rejoicing or to
gratify innate luxury: so they returned from the Babylonish captivity
with timbrels, and flutes, and psalteries, more suitably than with
crowns; and after eating and drinking, uncrowned, they rose up to play.
Neither would the account of the rejoicing nor the exposure of the
luxury have been silent touching the honour or dishonour of the crown.
Thus too Isaiah, as he says, “With timbrels, and psalteries, and
flutes they drink wine,”408
would have added
“with crowns,” if this practice had ever had place in the
things of God.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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